Chapter 17 Lucy
LUCY
Paint slid across the canvas with each stroke I made. It was like each stroke pulled something out of me from that night on Knox’s back porch.
The darkness outside, the flickering of light in his eyes, the snapping tension that crackled between us.
How he spoke to me. How he touched me. Like I was something special to him that he wanted to hold but wasn’t afraid to break.
I’d always been treated as delicate, unearthly—things that came from being from a rich family. The respect I’d seen strangers have for me was never real; it was made from fear, or from greedy desire to have what I had.
But he didn’t see me like that—he’d even told me as much, with his view on people like my dad. He saw me as Lucy.
I dipped my brush blindly into another color and layered it over the midnight blue already on the canvas.
Red streaked across the night sky, blending into it roughly in a way that joined the blue and the deep red, yet still held layers of perfect purple.
I was finally painting again—really painting. Not the one for Mr. Vender that, now finished, was propped against the wall in the corner, where Jackson was inspecting it, rubbing his little nose and paws all over it.
No. This one was mine. The shapes in it were more abstract, as one form morphed into another—such was the dark surrealism I loved, which ached in my core.
This wasn’t just me on a canvas. As I speckled white onto that deep night sky, as the specks swarmed together to form a whiplash of a moon, it was Knox and me under the night sky.
Sharp strokes from the bottom left, pitch black, and feeling like the shadows we both had around us, but not any more between us.
Sparks of light from the top of the canvas, raining down onto where one shape met another and became something else, showed those sparks I always felt between us.
As instantly as I started the painting, I stopped. The intense need to paint I’d felt itching at my skin since we’d left that tent now eased until I felt a sort of peace in fully living in the moment instead of remaining detached from my mind.
I dropped the paintbrush into the water cup, and drops of water sloshed over the side to join the mess of stains on my painting stand.
It was done.
There was no question that this was the painting I’d started at 9:15, when Knox had left the apartment for another interview—this time a sous-chef position at the French bistro a few blocks away.
I reached for one of my brushes with the narrowest handle, and I scratched my signature into the bottom right corner. Paint, still wet and thick, was pushed aside to make way for my brand.
This was something that was me in its entirety. I hadn’t painted my signature on Mr. Vender’s painting yet, even. It felt like someone else painted that. But not this one, which had my entire heart spilled onto the canvas.
I exhaled, long and heavy, and my chest felt as light as air.
“What the ever-loving hell is that, Lucy?”
I spun around, only to find Cordelia perched on my couch. Her arms were crossed to prop up the disgusted expression on her face, and one knee was dangling over the other, looking feminine and elegant in what must be a new dress and manicured curls that framed her face.
“Cordelia!” I choked, dropping my small-handled brush back onto the table by my cup. “When did you get here?”
She rolled her eyes and pushed herself to her feet, moving gracefully and swiftly, like a panther. Her arms were still crossed until she reached me and released them to swipe what must be a splatter of paint from my cheek.
“You’re a mess,” she scolded as she held out her finger, where red paint was indeed streaked. “What are you doing? This cannot be the painting for Mr. Vendor that you’re supposed to be finishing.”
I flinched. “No. I finished it. It’s over there.”
I pointed to where Jackson now lay, cleaning himself, leg flung high to expose all his netherregions to Cordelia.
“Oh, gross. When are you going to get rid of that cat? And why are you letting him near your painting? It’s supposed to be perfect, remember? That’s why father is paying for that chef of yours.”
I blushed, despite the barbs, because even the mention of Knox was enough to fluster me, apparently.
“There’s nothing wrong with Jackson, and Knox isn’t mine.”
“Knox?” She frowned. “You mean Mr. Bristol?”
I winced, caught. “He said to call him Knox.”
Her gaze sharpened then, like it always did when she was scanning me and finding my weaknesses.
“I’m sorry. Lucy, do you have a crush on your chef?”
I swallowed thickly and picked at the edge of my nail. “No. Of course not.”
Her eyes widened. “Lucian! What could you possibly be thinking?”
My heart jumped, and my stomach lurched. “It’s nothing. Really. Nothing happened.”
Lie, lie, lie, Lucy.
If I didn’t make her believe me, Knox would be the one who paid the price.
I’d seen more than one employee be blacklisted with other rich families because of something that seemed meaningless.
Nannies especially. Dad had been furious when Felicia, our nanny when I was twelve, started learning Korean with me, since I hadn’t heard it since Mom left.
“Something did,” Cordelia hissed, poking me in the sternum, hard. “I can see it all over your face. You’re pining over your employee?”
“He’s not my employee.” I stepped back, only for her to follow.
“Is that the excuse you made up in your head, Lucian?” she sneered as my legs hit the arm of the couch. “It doesn’t change the facts. He’s trying to take advantage of you, and you’re naive enough to believe him, aren’t you?”
I flinched. “Stop it. That’s not what this is.”
“Isn’t it?” she pushed. “You think he actually wants you? Some skinny hermit who holes up in his apartment all the time? Your groceries are brought in, and Dad and I have to drag you to social events. Face it. You’re not his type.
What he may or may not feel for you, whatever this ‘nothing’ is that ‘hasn’t happened’ is a lie.
What guy wouldn’t want his chance to bend a rich boy over the couch and take what he wants? ”
“That’s not–” I choked out, but cut myself off when my lungs seized, closing off my air supply. “He’s not–”
“Into you?” she finished, smile full of pity. “I know he’s not, Lucian. He’s pretending. We’re used to people pretending with us, aren’t we?”
She stepped back, giving me the space to breathe, even as a rock settled in my gut.
I did know how often people pretended with me. Pretended to like me, pretended I was interesting, and even pretended that they weren’t disappointed in me.
But Knox wasn’t like that, was he?
“You think on that,” Cordelia sighed, plucking up her purse from my coffee table.
“Think about our family, Lucian, and how you represent us. We don’t slum it with our chefs.
We don’t allow ourselves to get taken advantage of.
And we sure as hell aren’t naive enough to give ourselves up on a platter to people who would be all too eager to take what we offer. ”
She left with a click of the door, and the silence that remained had none of the earlier peace in it.
Instead, it held the ticking of the clock on my wall, reminding me that my time with Knox was limited and that he might not actually want to stay with me.
If I was something passing for him, I’d find out soon enough.